Stop The Massacre Against Peaceful Protestors of Sudan

DALLAS, April 8, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- It is with great sadness that the Sudanese American Physicians Association mourns the death of at least six confirmed people shot by al-Bashir's security forces during the last wave of protests against the current dictatorial regime in Sudan.

The total number of casualties is heavily disputed, as the government will not release an official report, but it is estimated to have already exceeded thousands with at least sixty people killed, six of them in the last two days according to the Central Committee of Sudan Doctors.

For the past four months the al-Bashir regime has continued to stifle and suffocate the peaceful demonstrations with unrestrained violence, including -but not limited to- the use of live ammunition against defenseless and peaceful protesters. 

This revolution is becoming a bloody one.

There have been wide reports of government militias breaking into homes, in the middle of the night and under the cover of darkness, with no identification, charges or warrants, assaulting unarmed families and making mass arrests. Video footage confirms that tear gas has been thrown into hospitals where patients were receiving urgent medical care. Political activists are being kidnapped left, right and center.  A state of emergency has been declared. No one has been spared from the madness; women, children, students, patients, even, doctors on the job have been targeted by the regime. This is domestic terrorism, plain and simple.

As this letter is being written, hundreds of thousands of people, continue to gather before the National Army Headquarters in Khartoum, virtually transforming it into a second reenactment of Egypt's anti-Mubarak's Tahrir Square. Young and old, rich and poor, educated and unlettered, Sudanese people have rallied, in response to a Call to Arms by the architects of the revolution: the Sudanese Professionals Association. They have assembled peacefully to protest this cancer of a regime, this dictatorial tyranny that has ruled for 30 years with a savage brutality and unembarrassed corruption that has brought the nation to its knees. The people categorically demand that President Omar Al-Bashir and his administration step down immediately and make way for a transitional government that honors the wishes and the dignity of the Sudanese people.

This is a human issue worthy of our attention and our support.

We, the Sudanese American Physicians Association, call upon our honorable elected officials and fellow citizens of the United States of America to lend their voices to ours. 

With urgency, we call upon the Trump Administration and the Congress of the United States of America to:

- Categorically condemn the killing of peaceful protesters by the Al-Bashir regime and demand an international judicial investigation on all the lives lost to the senseless violence.

- Demand that Khartoum immediately and unequivocally release all political prisoners and allow Sudanese citizens to exercise their right to peacefully protest. 

- Support liberty, justice, democracy and the peaceful transition of power to a transitional government that will comply with the wishes of the Sudanese people.

We understand that the fate of this regime, will only be decided by the sheer and insurmountable will of the Sudanese people themselves. 

The global community has remained blissfully silent, for four long months, as the suffering and strife of our people in the face of grave injustice, has gone unnoticed and underreported in the global media. Dr. Martin Luther King once powerfully said, "In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends." This silence speaks volumes and legitimizes this dictator in power.

It is high time for the international community, led by the United States, to stop legitimizing a failed regime, that has long been since delegitimized by the very people it holds captive: its own citizens. The Sudanese people have the right to self-determination. 

Our silence is our complicity. 

The time to act is now. 

More innocent lives can and will be lost.

There is a very real risk that the country may descend into further chaos and carnage if the United Stated does not intervene.

As conscious American citizens, we have done our part by bringing this to your attention. As statesmen, lawmakers and media, we depend on you to do yours.

Contact:
Yasir Elamin
+1 346 874 8221
[email protected]

SOURCE Sudanese American Physicians Association